Chong

Sang-il Lee's first project (a student film if I understood correctly) is a pretty short, basic drama. It's a film that deals with Korean immigrants living in Japan, a topic that was pretty hot back then. While not bad, the characters are a little thing and Lee's take is rather simplistic.

Tae-Seong is a North-Korean boy growing up in Japan. For the first time, a Korean baseball team is allowed to enter the youth leagues, a landmark event. Their first friendly game is a complete disaster. Tae-Seong wants to get better at the game, but it's not easy when his teammates are struggling with their identity.

The performances are decent, but the cinematography is bland, there isn't that much depth and the issues have been dealt with better in subsequent films. It's still a nice enough film and you can't be too critical of what is basically a student film, but Lee would become a lot better later on in his career.